Vehbi Ismail Haki; Pioneer of Publishing Quranic Knowledge in Albanian

IQNA – Vehbi Ismail Haki, a famous Albanian writer and thinker, played an important role in introducing the Quranic and Islamic culture to the people of his country with the numerous works he wrote in Arabic, English and Albanian.

According to a report on Muslimsaroundtheworld, Albania is a Muslim country in the southeast of the European continent and is a neighbor of Greece, Serbia and Macedonia. Its capital is Tirana and 70 percent of the country’s population is Muslim.

There are different opinions about how Islam entered this region. Some believe that Albania’s first contact with Islam was through Iranian merchants, before the Ottoman domination of the Balkans. While transporting their goods, these merchants had close contact with the people and invited people to Islamic beliefs without pressure. Therefore, the people recognized Islam as a religion of tolerance and believed in it, and this was the first presence of Islam in this country.

Another view is that Albanians were introduced to Islam through the activities of the Sicilian Arabs, especially in the Lega region of Albania. Archaeological evidence shows the Arab-Islamic influence of Sicily centuries before the Ottomans, and there are still Arabic names for villages in the region, confirming that Muslim Arabs lived there. With the arrival of the Ottomans in the Balkans, Islam spread rapidly throughout the country, and people converted to the religion in large numbers.

Albania has produced great Islamic scholars who have made great contributions to the transmission and spread of the Islamic culture. One of these famous scholars is Vehbi Ismail Haki.

Vehbi Ismail was born in 1919 in the city of Shkodra in northern Albania, one of the oldest cities in the country, dating back more than two thousand years. During the long Ottoman rule (1479-1912), Shkodra became the center of Islamic culture as Islam spread throughout northern Albania. Prominent figures in the field of Islamic sciences and education were raised in this city.

Vehbi Ismail Haki, The heir to his father

Vehbi Ismail was born at a critical time for the fate of the city. The city experienced significant political upheavals during a critical period of instability and occupation fluctuations during World War I. Vehbi Ismail’s father, Haki, was a well-known imam in the city and a learned man with a rich library of thousands of books in Arabic, Ottoman and Persian. His father’s poems, written in Albanian script, were a continuation of the cultural heritage that had developed in the country over the centuries, and he had a profound influence on Vehbi Ismail’s upbringing.

Vehbi Ismail’s move to Cairo coincided with the shift in the direction of Albanian students’ education in Cairo instead of Istanbul since 1923, when the “Albanian Muslim Community” was established in Egypt. This institution represented Muslims in the country and, after separating from the Council of Muslim Elders of Istanbul, supervised their religious and cultural affairs.

He graduated from Al-Azhar in the summer of 1945. However, he could not return to his homeland because the communist regime had taken power in his country and left no room for religious believers. Therefore, he decided to make Egypt his second home.

During those years, he became well acquainted with the Arabic culture and collaborated with the most important Arab cultural magazines (Al-Thaqafah, Al-Risalah and Al-Hilal), which featured prominent Arab writers of the 20th century such as Taha Hussein, Abbas Mahmoud Al-Akkad, Abdul Qader Al-Muzaini, Ahmed Amin, Ahmed Zaki, Mikhail Naimi, Mahmoud Timur, Yusuf Al-Seba'i, Bint Al-Shati and others. He was friends with most of these writers.

On the other hand, his presence in Cairo during the height of Arab sentiment on the eve of the 1948 war and his relations with prominent figures in Cairo at the time, such as Ahmed Helmy Abdel Baqi, head of the “General Government of Palestine”, inspired his story ”On the Field of Jihad”, which was published in the magazine Al-Risala in February 1949, in the final weeks before his departure for Albania. The story revolves around the participation of Albanians and Bosnians in the 1948 Palestine war.

Introducing Albanian Culture to the World

He published his first collection of short stories, “The Golden Cradle”, in 1948. He said of that book: “The love of writing had taken hold of me and I was prepared to take this path; so I wrote stories that depicted the traditions and customs of my beloved country, Albania.”

In 1949, Vehbi Ismail moved to the United States at the invitation of the president of the Albanian Muslim American Association, which had been founded in Detroit, Michigan, in 1945. The association needed an Albanian imam, a graduate of a famous university, who could easily convey religious teachings in Albanian to workers and children. Vehbi Ismail, who also knew English, was one of the candidates. There, he worked to establish the first mosque and cultural center.

At this stage, various aspects of Vehbi Ismail’s service became apparent. He became known as an imam, a writer of religious works, a writer of short stories, a novelist, and a translator from Arabic to Albanian. He also published a quarterly magazine, founded a publishing house and a library, and began publishing his works in Albanian. He also participated in the translation of some Arabic literary works into Albanian, such as the play “The Companions of the Cave” by Tawfiq al-Hakim and other works. After the reception of this play, Vehbi Ismail continued his work and translated the play “Muhammad (PBUH); Prophet of Humanity” by Tawfiq al-Hakim, which was published in Detroit in 1987.

He also published the book “Bilal, Muezzin of the Prophet (PBUH)” in 1988 and “Salman al-Farsi, Seeker of Truth” in 1989.

The Challenge of Translating the Quran into Albanian

After this rich experience in translating from Arabic to Albanian and vice versa, Vehbi Ismail finally decided to take on the challenge of translating the Holy Quran into Albanian. Muslim scholars in Albania had basically refrained from translating the Quran, despite centuries of Islam’s spread among Albanians. They believed that learning and reading the Quran in Arabic was essential, at least for daily prayers.

However, with the declaration of Albanian independence in 1912, as a result of the efforts of the Albanian nationalist movement that united Muslims and Christians and promoted national culture, one of the leaders of the nationalist movement, I. Qafzi, took the initiative to translate the Quran into Albanian from English and published the first part in 1921, considering it a cultural source for most Albanians (Muslims), a source that should be known to everyone.

Vehbi Ismail, starting from the third issue of the magazine “Albanian Muslim Life” in 1950, began to publish some of the Surahs of the Quran (Al-Fatiha, Al-Baqarah, Al-Hujurat, Al-Furqan, etc.), which were well received. Then he decided to translate the entire Quran, which he did. He had finished typing the translation and to raise funds for the printing of this book, he traveled to some Arab countries. However, during this trip, the bag in which he had placed the translation was lost, and he waited for months hoping to find it, but he could not.

Vehbi Ismail told his friend Fathi Mehdiu, who was interested in translating the Quran, that due to his old age he was no longer able to do a new translation. This allowed Mehdiu to complete the work he had long dreamed of. Mehdiu was busy translating the Quran into Albanian in communist Yugoslavia, while having a copy of the Quran in every house in communist Albania would land its owner in prison, until in 1985 he published the book Translation of the Holy Quran in Albanian in Pristina, which was the first complete translation of the Quran from Arabic into Albanian.

Vehbi Ismail, who was satisfied with this translation, promoted it in the United States and Canada. He also introduced this translation at the First International Symposium on Quranic Translations, held in Istanbul in 1986.

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